As the increasing population of MMO gamers, many players may have suffered from helpless because of in-game crime. But in Holland, that will never bother players any more. A Dutch court has convicted two youths of theft for stealing virtual items in a computer, reporting by Radio Netherlands.

The details are as below:

Cyber goods
The public prosecutor argued, in what has become known as the 'Runescape Gold' case, that virtual items used in the game should be considered as real and tangible goods as they have real, tangible value for the owner. The prosecutor noted that winning, collecting and trading Runescape Gold objects play an important role in the virtual world and can also be sold for money in the real world.

According to the public prosecutor, if these items are valuable to their owner and he has been forced to hand them over to somebody else, it should be considered theft. The lawyer representing the culprits argued that legally, the items do not exist and therefore cannot be considered to have been stolen.

Material object
The court dismissed the defence lawyer's argument and cited an earlier ruling that electricity can be considered a material object for the purposes of criminal law and stealing electricity is theft. The court ruled that the same principle can be applied in this case and stealing virtual Runescape Gold items is theft as the owner was forced to hand over his possessions.